Set Fire To The Rain
by kerigocrazy
Summary: After a decade spent tied to an imprint who wants anything but what she's been given, Paul has hit an emotional rock bottom. Can Seth change the course of his future? Is it even possible to get past the imprint? My entry for the "C'mon Baby Light My Fire" O/S Contest on JBNP.


**Entry for the JBNP ****"********Come on Baby Light Our Fire****" ****Anonymous One-shot Contest**

**Title: **Set Fire To The Rain

**Pairing: **Paul/Seth

**Rating: **MA

**Disclaimer: **All publicly recognizable characters and situations are the property of Stephanie Meyer. No copyright infringement is title was borrowed (blatantly stolen) from Adele's song. Not making any money off of that either...sigh.

**Warnings: **Contains mature language, smut, and m/m slash.

**Word count: **2147

**Penname: **kerigocrazy

**A/N: **So, this one didn't win, but I'm pretty okay with that considering all the entries were absolutely wonderful. Have you read them yet? You should totally get on that...you know, as soon as you finish reading this one.

Thanks so much to Maria Vilson for taking on yet another story and making it all pretty and readable.

* * *

It had been ten, long years since the showdown with the red-eyed vampires. The pack sprawled around another bonfire, and it seemed to Paul as if nothing had changed. That wasn't true of course. There were a host of new faces illuminated by the flames. Children and recent imprints. Some people were missing as well. Old Quil had joined his ancestors four years ago; it was sad to say that he was not sorely missed.

The biggest changes in Paul's world had something to do with the red-lacquered nails digging into his left bicep, and the sad brown eyes staring from across the fire.

"Paul, are you even listening to me?"

When he first imprinted, he'd assumed that he finally found a safe haven. Soft arms to hold him at the end of a long day. A warm body to take him in when the world became too much.

And for awhile, that's what it was.

Rachel was all sweet smiles and romance in the beginning. For once, Paul had taken his time. If there was one thing he knew, it was women. He didn't want his imprint to think he was after nothing but sex. One of his only childhood memories was of his mom and dad dancing in the living room, long after he was supposed to be asleep, to no music. That's what he wanted for himself.

So he wooed her. Brought her small gifts and took his time getting to know her. When they finally made it to bed, Paul tried to make love for the first time.

Two months in and it all went to shit.

She hadn't realized that the imprint trapped her. They had been lounging in bed when she mentioned that she needed to sign up for her classes next semester.

"Are you transferring to Port Angeles?" he asked.

"Why would I do that? I'm halfway done in Seattle."

"Yeah, but you know I can't leave. Right?"

Her whole body stiffened as she slowly sat up, clutching the sheet across her bare breasts. "What? Well, can't you just visit on the weekends?"

"I'm sorry, Rach, but we can't be that far apart for that long, and Sam's not going to let me off patrol enough to see you. Not to mention the gas. We just can't afford for me to drive back and forth that often. I'd phase and run, but I think someone might notice a giant wolf running through the city."

She had shut down for the next week, rebuffing any attempts for sex or conversation. Later, although she seemed to accept her new situation, something changed. There was no more romance between them. The softness and warmth had become sharp edges and angry words.

He found himself spending more and more time away from the house. His brothers were happy to have the new, more approachable Paul around, but one of them could tell something was up.

Seth Clearwater had been watching Paul for years.

There was something about the angry boy turned weary man that drew him in. Yes, he exuded sex in a way that seemed almost supernatural, but the truth was that Seth saw right past that into the something sweeter Paul craved. He wanted to give that to him. Wrap him up in strong arms and make the world disappear.

It broke him, a little, to watch the swagger and confidence slowly drain away over the years.

The pack ribbed Paul incessantly, said that his imprint was a miracle worker for taming the beast. Quil hadn't had his nose broken for years. Seth sat back and wondered how they could miss it; they were losing him and nobody seemed to realize anything was wrong.

In the beginning, all Paul would take was a physical outlet, and Seth understood. He offered his body as a place to forget, a few hours of hard fucking and emotional silence. It had hurt, the first few times, but he pushed through, thought of it as a small price to pay in order to wipe away the haunted look in the other man's eyes.

Before long, he welcomed the brief sting and he stretched to accommodate him easily. Like their bodies were made for each other, Seth couldn't help but think the gods had got it wrong. He never pushed, knew that if he did his lover would run, but eventually something shifted between them.

The first time he came to him for something other than fucking, he gained back a small piece of himself. It was four years into their relationship, and Rachel had made a comment about maybe it was time to get pregnant. He ran.

Seth was waiting. He sat him down on the couch and disappeared for a few minutes, coming back with a hair clipper and a stack of towels.

"What are you doing?" Paul had asked, posture stiff and uncomfortable. He'd been ready to say fuck it and wrestle the other man to the floor.

"Hush," Seth said, clipping a towel around Paul's neck and spreading the others across the floor. "Don't move."

For the next few minutes, the only sound in the room was the buzz of the clippers and their matched breathing. It was almost magic, Paul thought. With each pile of hair that hit the ground, he felt a layer of weariness fall away. As if Seth were peeling the anger and bitterness off of him, one pass at a time.

When he was finished, Seth ran a large palm across the freshly buzzed hair and removed the towel. "Better?"

"Yeah. Thanks, man."

He squeezed his shoulder and went to get the broom. "No worries."

A few years later and Paul felt like he was closer to rock bottom than he'd ever been. It was as if, with each derisive glance and dismissive word, she was leeching away everything that made him the man he was.

"Can't you do anything right, Paul?"

"It's no wonder your father left; you're not easy to love, you know."

And so it went, until his spirit was bruised and battered beyond recognition. It had been a year since he'd run to his safe haven. A pregnancy scare forced him to try and make it work with his imprint. Seth understood; he didn't like it, but he understood.

Which is why he was surprised to find a shame faced Paul standing with hunched shoulders on his porch at three am.

"C'mon then," he murmured, stepping aside so the other man could enter the warmth of his home. How much more could he take?

"I'm...sorry. I just needed get away. Needed to breathe."

"Shh," Seth murmured, placing a hand along the back of Paul's neck and leading him through the dark house. "I understand."

They removed their clothes in silence, before crawling into bed. This wasn't about sex, Seth knew, so he ignored his prominent erection and pulled the larger man into his body, sighing at the heat moving between them.

"Come lay your head down then."

Paul drifted away in a wash of steady breathing and the rhythmic heartbeat of the only person who really saw him anymore. Here was safety. Comfort.

It was right before dawn, when Seth woke up to the feel of a hard length pressing against him. Paul was slippery, already prepared, and he slid in, slow and measured, once he was sure the other man was awake.

They never spoke.

Just rocked together, the sweet rasping of skin against skin and the press of open mouthed kisses along the back of Seth's neck the closest thing to a declaration that he could come. It was all thank-yous and silent I love yous as they came together.

After, Seth pretended to fall back asleep, as the strongest man he knew pressed against his back and cried silent tears in the hollow of his throat.

Now, staring across a fire that seemed an insurmountable barrier, he watched, with pained eyes, the shell of a beautiful man. It was her body language that alerted him, the tightening of her grip on his arm and the pinching of her lips.

Sam's voice filtered into his hearing, as their Alpha wove one of their most sacred tales. "And so it was decreed that a select few warriors would receive the gift of a woman, the other half of their battle weary souls, and the bond between the two would be the warrior's saving grace—unbreakable.

He couldn't listen anymore. Rising quickly from his crouch next to his sister and her husband, Jacob Black, he met Paul's eyes, just briefly, before striding down the beach, away from the vision of the man he loved trapped in her arms. It was too much.

Paul watched him walk away, a pained noise the only indication that he was aware. The tightening of

Rachel's fist broke him out of his miserable haze.

"I want you, Paulie," she breathed, pressing a close-mouthed kiss to his bare shoulder.

He hated that name. She knew it.

"Let's go." She stood and took a step, expecting him to be right behind her.

"No."

"No? You're really saying no to me?"

That last indefinable piece of him, something resembling hope, broke away and he knew that no matter how much pain it would bring, he was done.

"No."

He could see the argument rising in her eyes, but something in his face must have stopped her. "Whatever. Your loss." She stomped off in the direction of their car, not once looking back.

The pack hadn't even noticed the argument. It was as if he'd become invisible over the years. For once, he was okay with that. Taking a deep breath, he stood and headed out in the direction Seth had taken.

He found him at the cliffs, bare chested with bloody knuckles from taking his frustrations out on the neighboring trees. They stood beneath roiling storm clouds, lost in each other's eyes.

"I'm sorry," Paul said.

"Don't."

"I love you."

Seth's whole body jerked. "But you need her. I...I don't know if I can do this anymore."

Paul sidled closer to him, slowly laying hands on Seth's heaving shoulders. "You're not listening."

"I am. I've done nothing but listen for years," Seth cried out. He was so tired.

"Shh," Paul breathed, pulling the smaller man in close, a hand wrapped around the back of his neck, the other pressed into the small of his back. "I'm saying I'm done with her."

"But, what about the bond? You have to be close to her."

"It's true that it hurts when I'm away, but I've been hurting right next to her for years."

"But—"

"No. No buts. The only thing that's made me happy in the last ten years is you." He paused, all of a sudden feeling insecure. "That is, if you want me."

A sweet smile overtook his face as the clouds broke and the rain came pouring down. "You're the only thing I've ever wanted."

Their lips met in a soft kiss. It was a question and an answer, all tied together in a package that bore straight to the bone. A benediction.

"I want you," Paul breathed. "Please?"

Seth fell to his knees before him, drops of water clinging to his thick lashes as he pulled his pants off and gripped his dick in a rough fist.

"Yes."

His mouth was heaven, Paul thought, groaning at the heat. "More."

Sucking harder, Seth hollowed out his cheeks, wanting to swallow him down, lash their bodies together so tightly he'd never run away again. Never go back to her.

"I won't," Paul murmured, brushing a hand along his jaw.

There was nothing left to say. Seth brought him to the edge over and over again, and before long Paul was begging. Please god, let him come. So he did, drinking him down. This was everything he ever wanted.

But Paul wasn't finished. He wanted to worship that body. Show him, the only way he knew how, that this was the way it was supposed to be, that the gods had got it wrong.

He took him down to the damp grass, and they slid together, slick from the rain. He mapped his lover's body with soft lips and an eager tongue, learning him all over again.

The past was washed away in what felt like a single long moment. Fuck the imprint.

The only thing that mattered was the body underneath his and the knowledge that this man wasn't going anywhere. When he came home, the taste of leech heavy on his tongue, Seth would be there with open arms and understanding silence.

"C'mon then," he'd say. "Lay your head down."


End file.
